I am really sad about Harper Lee’s death. Don’t get me wrong. She was 89 and died of natural causes, so it’s not a tragedy, per se. But, what it is (at least for me) is the loss of a cultural icon.
Even if you don’t know who Harper Lee is, you know her book. To Kill a Mockingbird is a classic book that almost every American teenager has read as required reading in school. And, the book is truly beautiful and honest and authentic to the author’s life. She was speaking about a truth that she wanted to highlight.
“I want to do the best I can with the talent God gave me, I would like to leave some record of the kind of life that existed in a very small world.”
– Harper Lee, 1964
Her advocacy for human rights was in her writing – in her art. And, I would like to leave the same sort of legacy. She inspires me a great deal… and it’s not just me… she did win a Pulitzer Prize, for goodness sake.
Source: HuffPost – Harper Lee, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author Of ‘To Kill A Mockingbird,’ Dies…
More about Harper Lee:
Humanism in Literature Series Spotlight
New York Times Reports on the Death